New Cd Features Finnish Composer

Classical Remarks

May 29, 1994|By RAYMOND JONES Columnist

Chandos turns to Finland and England for its latest release. The result is 20th-century music of the best sort.

Sibelius cast a long shadow across the Finnish musicscape, and Uuno Klami flourished nicely in that shadow. Living through part of Sibelius' life (Klami's years are 1900-1961), Klami studied with Florent Schmitt in France and has a twist of neoclassicism that overlays his Nordic tendencies. Utterly tonal and melodic, his most famous work was the "Kalevala" Suite, a work conducted by the likes of Stokowski and Antal Dorati.

That gesture to Finnish mythology gets a splendid new reading from the Iceland Symphony under Petri Sakari on this new Chandos CD (CHAN 9268). My old "Finlandia" LP, which also held the "Sea Pictures" done here by Petri and his orchestra, can safely be retired to the analog vaults. The final "sea picture" is titled "Force 3" and indicates a moderate breeze on the Beaufort wind scale. Program notes by Erkki Salmenharra claim that the third work on this disc, the "Karelian" Rhapsody, shows Klami taking a decisive step away from Sibelius, but you can't prove it to me by the music - very dark, very well-crafted, very Sibelian!

BEHOLD HOLST. Most of the music of Gustav Holst tends to be overshadowed by his immensely popular suite, "The Planets." A new Chandos disc (CHAN 9270) lets us enjoy a spread of works from this minor English master who lived from 1874 to 1934. The "St. Paul's Suite for Strings" is probably the best-known work on this disc. Written for his student orchestra when Holst was director of St. Paul's Girls School in 1905, it uses the tune "Greensleeves" in the finale and some other nice effects.

Richard Hickox is at the helm of the City of London Sinfonia and offers up the seldom-heard "Brook Green" Suite along with the Lyric Movement for Viola and Small Orchestra, "Two Songs Without Words," A Fugual Concerto, and the Concerto for Two Violins and Orchestra. It's the type of album Lyrita used to do with Holst's conductor daughter, Imogen Holst, but with even finer playing and recorded sound. A must for Holst collectors!